The people of Tusculum cleverly repaired their fault. When Camillus
marched to attack them they filled the country with men working in the
fields and tending cattle just as in time of peace; the city gates were
open, the boys at school, the lower classes plying various trades, and
the richer citizens walking in the market-place in peaceful dress. The
magistrates bustled about the city, pointing out where the Romans were
to be quartered, as if the thought of treachery had never entered their
minds. Camillus, though this conduct did not shake his belief in their
guilt, was moved to pity by their repentance. He ordered them to go to
Rome and beg the Senate to pardon them; and when they appeared, he
himself used his influence to procure their forgiveness, and the
admission of Tusculum to the Roman franchise. These were the most
remarkable events of his sixth tribuneship.

XXXIX. After this, Licinius Stolo put himself at the head of the
plebeians in their great quarrel with the Senate. They demanded that
consuls should be re-established, one of whom should always be a
plebeian, and that they should never both be patricians. Tribunes of the
people were appointed, but the people would not suffer any election of
consuls to be held. As this want of chief magistrates seemed likely to
lead to still greater disorders, the Senate, much against the will of
the people, appointed Camillus dictator for the fourth time. He himself
did not wish for the post, for he was loth to oppose men who had been
his comrades in many hard-fought campaigns, as indeed he had spent much
more of his life in the camp with his soldiers than with the patrician
party in political intrigues, by one of which he was now appointed, as
that party hoped that if successful he would crush the power of the
plebeians, while in case of failure he would be ruined. However, he made
an effort to deal with the present difficulty. Knowing the day on which